


glowy stars

by uforock



Category: DuckTales (Cartoon 2017)
Genre: Character Study, F/F, Fluff, Not Beta Read
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-13
Updated: 2019-09-13
Packaged: 2020-10-17 11:08:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,826
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20620034
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/uforock/pseuds/uforock
Summary: Sometimes, it felt like if Lena was made up of pure shadow, Webby was made up of pure light. They were two sides of the same coin, so to speak.





	glowy stars

**Author's Note:**

> this is a little incoherent but ive been sitting on it for too long just Take it

Lena was working on coming to terms with herself, as an entity. As a creature. She couldn’t bring herself to say  _ person _ , just yet, because it felt like a lie. 

But she was real, and for now, that was enough for her. She was a shadow, but she was still  _ something _ . 

Sometimes, it felt like if she was made up of pure shadow, Webby was made up of pure light. They were two sides of the same coin, so to speak. 

Webby was  _ bright _ , in every sense of the word. She was brilliant, even. It felt like she always had answers, always had something to say, constant as the stars shining above. She wore bright colors, her smile was bright, her eyes sparkled… 

Lena couldn’t help but find a bit of serendipity in the fact that Webby took a pair of night vision goggles as part of her standard adventure gear. She was always prepared to deal with darkness, and yet, Lena still wondered if she was… too dark, even for Webby to handle.

In her shadow form, she wasn’t  _ just _ shadow. She was vantablack, she was a black hole. She _swallowed_ light, like an ink stain on the surface of reality. She tried to not let anyone, especially Webby see her like that, if she could help it, but when nightmares hit it was hard to keep a stable form, so easy to sink into the darkness, feeling her body melt into the shade beneath the blankets. 

“Lena?”

Shoot. She focused, bringing herself back. “Mm- yeah, Webs?”

“Oh, you were in the shadows again. I just got worried,” she whispered, wrapping a sleepy arm around Lena’s shoulders and resting her head on her chest. 

Lena didn’t actually need to breathe. Her heart didn’t beat. She didn’t bleed, or bruise, or scar. Webby was so fragile to her, and being able to hold her like this was so calming. Just… knowing she was safe. Knowing both of them were safe, right here, without anything to worry about. She could feel Webby’s heartbeat through her chest, feel the little puffs of her breath against her cheek, feel the warmth of her body heat radiating through the both of them like her own little star.

“I’m fine,” Lena reassured her, running her fingers through Webby’s hair as she fell back asleep, a smile on her face, so bright that Lena could forget her own darkness and just bask in her warmth.

-

Lena was afraid of the dark. It was something she had come to realize quickly, even after Magica lost her powers. The darkness would warp and contort in her vision, making her fear that she was in danger yet again. That something would hurt her.

She found a solution to this in an unexpected place. She had been wandering around the mansion, looking for something to do while Webby was doing her own thing, and bumped into someone she hadn’t seen before.

“...Do you live here? I thought there was only one teenage girl around here.”

He was rolling a cart around, big glasses on, and Lena rolled her eyes. “And I thought Huey was the only nerd in the building.”

He scoffed. “Alright, cool it. I was just asking.”

Lena hopped up, standing on the bottom tier of the cart. “Whacha got there? Some kinda nerd gizmo?”

He seemed to stiffen at her word choice, pushing the cart further down the hall as she rolled along with him, refusing to let go of the cart. “Not that it’s any of your business, but I suppose you could say that.”

“What does it do?”

He let out an exasperated sigh. “If I tell you, will you leave me alone?”

“That depends.”

“On?”

She shrugged. “A lot of things. So really you’ve got nothing to lose by telling me.”

“...It’s a new kind of fiber-optic cable.”

“Oh? Tell me more.”

“Do you really wanna know, or are you just doing this to torment me?”

She laughed at that, brushing her bangs back. “Whatever keeps you happy, I’m just bored here. All these magical artifacts just lying around, but there’s still nothing to do!”

“Well, if you’re bored, that makes two of us.” He seemed to think for a moment, before giving in. “It’s a solar powered light that emits no heat, and can last several hours after only a few seconds of sun exposure.”

“...Like a glow in the dark sticker?”

He looked scandalized, frowning deeply, recoiling back a bit. “No, not like a mere  _ glow in the dark _ sticker! These could be revolutionary! Because they emit no heat, they, in theory, could run off of their own light. They’d be able to last for  _ weeks  _ with no outside power before entropy started to take effect! Can your glow in the dark stickers do  _ that?” _

“Dunno. I don’t think they’re glowy enough to do that. Ooh, so they’re just really bright glow in the dark strings? You should consider getting in on the sticker game, Inspector Gadget.”

“...Gyro. My name is Gyro.”

She blinked up at him. “Lena.”

They shook hands, and Lena rested her head on the cart. “So… These glowy fiber things. Could you theoretically use them, like, in place of fabric strings?”

He scoffed. “I was planning to use them as a type of emergency lining for carpets and clothes in case of power outages, so, yeah. Why?”

Lena wouldn’t look at him, fiddling with something around her wrist.

“No reason.”

“...So you, and I know you definitely are, going to try and steal my invention for… no reason?”

She sat up. “Whaaaaaaaaaaat? Pffsh. No. I’ve never stolen anything in my life.”

Gyro groaned and shut his eyes tight for a moment. “I can just  _ give  _ you a prototype if you want it that badly. For once, this invention has absolutely no potentially dangerous qualities to it.”

She groaned. “But it’d be so much fun to steal it! Especially if it were dangerous!”

He shook his head, stopping the cart. “What do you even want it for?”

Lena paused, trying to figure him out. She hadn’t seen him around before, so he was probably not the type to spread rumors. And he couldn’t gain anything by knowing, right?

Right.

“It’s for a bracelet.”

“Psh. That’s it? Just some measly bracelet?”

“An  _ important _ bracelet, doc. It’s for someone important.”

He grumbled and went back to pushing his cart in silence. Eventually, he rolled to a stop, a set of double doors in front of them. “I’m supposed to present these to Mr. McDuck now. If you want some, go ahead, just don’t take all of it.”

She squinted at him, stuffing her hand in the box and wrapping a fistful of the strings around her hand. “...Thanks, nerd.”

“Yeah, yeah, now go scamper off before I change my mind,” he rolled his eyes, putting his weight on his elbows as she hopped off of the cart. 

She did so, looking at the glowing strands of fabric in her hands. They felt like ribbons, but thicker. Like the outside of a life jacket, sturdy but soft. They glowed about as much as a phone screen on half brightness might, but they weren’t getting dimmer.

It was just long enough to wrap around her wrist. Perfect.

Webby’s room was a bit of a mess, but after shadowing Webby for so long she knew where everything was kept. Webby had a stash of craft supplies that she kept on a high shelf, just up enough that Lena had to climb to reach it. After almost knocking the box onto her head, she took out some string, in a variety of colors.

Lena didn’t like magic at the best of times, but it was pretty easy to do once she got over the fear that she was going to end up like her aunt. It was like learning to ride a bike, it just came natural to her.

She took a cord of regular, plain orange string in her hands (Webby had a lot of orange string, apparently she didn’t use the color very often), focusing, letting shadow drip over it like ink. She closed her eyes, and when she opened them, the string was like a shadow in itself, dark and strange to look at. 

Lena smiled to herself. Perfect.

-

“Hey, Pink, I’ve got something for you.”

Webby looked up, her eyes lighting up at the sight of Lena, even though they had been sitting next to each other on opposite ends of the bed for the last hour or so. They just did that sometimes, sitting together in silence. Webby could compare Lena to a cat in that respect. She had a habit of considering  _ hanging out _ to be sitting in a room together, barely interacting at all. 

“What’s up?”

“Catch,” Lena tossed something towards her without looking up. It landed in her hands, small and lightweight.

It was a simple friendship bracelet, but not like the one she had. It looked like ribbons of light and shadow were wrapping around each other, intertwining with strings in shades of pink and blue. “Woah,” Webby marveled. “Did you make this?”

Lena nodded, trying not to make her constant glancing at Webby’s face in an attempt to look for a reaction too obvious. “I enchanted the black strings, but the glowy ones are from some crackpot nerd that was wandering around the mansion. One of Scrooge’s scientists, I think.”

“Wait, you  _ enchanted _ it?”

Lena shifted a little, finally looking up at Webby to see the awe in her eyes. “Yeah. It’s just a simple glamour thing- to make the strings look like shadows. I thought it’d be cool, with the light and the dark. Like us. I can always take the enchantment off if you don-”

“No! I love it!” Webby cried, fastening the bracelet onto her wrist. She held her arm out, admiring the steady glow and the sharp shadows that contrasted against it. “It’s beautiful…”

“Yeah, well,” Lena gave a half smile. “I have a beautiful muse.”

Webby let her words sink in before laughing and shoving her, Lena laughing along. “You’re such a sap!”

“Says you!” She giggled back, throwing a pillow at Webby. Webby caught it and pounced at Lena, wrapping her up in a big, tight hug that felt like she was being stitched back together again. Something in her heart said  _ this is right _ . 

“Thank you,” Webby spoke, cuddling into her. Lena froze for a moment, before running a hand through her hair. 

“No problem, Pink.”

-

When they went to bed that night, the cool green glow of the bracelet kept the darkness at bay. Lena smiled at the way it lit up Webby’s face in the dark. At the faint glow of the stars on the ceiling. 

She didn’t need to be afraid anymore. The dark was all _hers_, nothing she couldn't control.

She intertwined her fingers with Webby's and shut her eyes.

**Author's Note:**

> please comment if you liked it!! : D


End file.
